About this sermon
1. The supernatural origin of Jesus the Christ (vv. 18-20).
2. What our Lord’s supernatural origin teaches us about His person (v. 20).
3. What our Lord’s name reveals about His Divine mission (v. 21).
Sermon transcript
remain standing for the reading of God’s Word. We continue this morning, this sermon series, this mini series called Foundations of Faith, a series, a Bible-based series that is being guided by the Apostles’ Creed, that great classic creed of the faith. And this morning, the title of my sermon is Foundations of Faith, I Believe in Jesus Christ. Our passage for this morning, taken from Matthew’s Gospel, Matthew chapter one, Verses 18 through 21, that’s what we’ll be focusing on today. Although I’m gonna read verses 18 through 25 to kind of fill out the context. Matthew chapter one, beginning at verse 18, reading through verse 25. Dear friends, hear the word of God. Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.
And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel, which means God with us. When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him. He took his wife, but knew her not until she had given birth to a son, and he called his name Jesus.
Dear ones, the grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let’s pray for the Lord to bless the proclamation of His Word. Our Lord God and Heavenly Father, we pray that by Your Spirit, You would take Your Word and plant it deeply within our souls. We pray that the seed of Your Word would indeed take deep root in our hearts and bear much spiritual fruit unto salvation and sanctification in our lives. We pray that you would help us to be attentive and we ask that you would grant unto me, your unworthy servant, the grace to declare and proclaim your word with clarity and power for the glory of your name and for the building up of your church. In Jesus’ name we pray and all of God’s people said. Amen.
You may be seated. Again, direct your attention to the sermon outline, which was made available in the foyer, and I’d encourage the children to choose a couple of the key words to keep track of during my sermon today. If that helps you to understand and follow along with the sermon, there’s quite a number of words to listen for. And friends, again, as I mentioned, the title of my sermon today is Foundations of Faith, I Believe in Jesus Christ. Well, dear friends, what is it that makes biblical historic Christianity distinct from every other religion and every other religious system out there in the world? Well, I had the opportunity and privilege in college to be a religious studies major, and one thing I can tell you is that students of comparative religion will often highlight the surface level similarities that exist between the various world religions, including Christianity.
And so, for example, some of those similarities might include such things as supernatural beliefs, that is, belief in a supernatural being or beings, the study of writings that are regarded by the religion as sacred scripture, a belief in prophets or holy men who speak for or represent the divine, the practice of prayer, religious rituals, the observance of sacred days, and so forth. The list could go on. And certainly at least the great Western religions, namely Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, share these kinds of surface-level similarities with one another. And so, for example, our Muslim friends, they have their own holy book, which they call the Quran. They believe that their final prophet was Muhammad. They hold him in high regard. They also believe that Jesus was a prophet, but not the final prophet, and so forth.
And so there are some similarities. But the one factor that sets Orthodox biblical Christianity apart from every other religion in the world is, of course, the person and work of its founder, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus of Nazareth, a man whom we Christians believe to be not merely a great prophet of God, though he certainly was that, but a man whom we also confess to be the promised Messiah, the divine Son of God and Lord incarnate, the living Word made flesh who came to dwell in our midst, the one and only God-appointed Savior for sinners. Dear ones, our passage for this Lord’s Day morning from St. Matthew’s Gospel account introduces us to this amazing man whom we confess to be our divine Lord and Savior. And in Matthew’s account of our Lord’s supernatural conception and virgin birth, the supernatural origin of Jesus Christ is highlighted and underscored.
Friends, it is on the basis of passages such as this one that the historic church has confessed in the words of the second credo of that famous creed known as the Apostle’s Creed, I believe in Jesus Christ, his only begotten son, our Lord. This Lord’s Day morning, we focus on the first part of that second credo, namely the words, I believe in Jesus Christ. We’re gonna consider what it means to believe in Jesus Christ and who Jesus Christ is. Our passage from God’s word for this Lord’s Day morning reveals some vital truths about our Lord, about his person and about his mission in the world. So as we turn our attention to our passage for this Lord’s Day morning, let’s first consider from verses 18 through 20, the supernatural origin of Jesus the Christ. Our passage for today highlights and points to the supernatural origin of Jesus the Christ.
We’re told in verse 18, now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. And so Matthew is presenting us with historic information about the birth of a real man of history, namely Jesus Christ. And by the way, the evidence for the existence of a man named Jesus is profound. It’s not just in the Bible, but there are secular sources that confirm that Jesus indeed was a real man of history. And even the most skeptical scholars believe that. There are only a few. on the fringes who dispute that, and they don’t have good reasons for disputing that. The evidence is very firm. Jesus Christ did exist as a man of history, and of course, he was born. But how did his birth take place? Well, that’s what Matthew focuses on in our passage for today.
Now, notice how he describes Jesus of Nazareth in this first statement here in verse 18. The birth of Jesus Christ. When you hear the name Jesus Christ, My suspicion is that many folks, especially here in the West, we have a custom, you have a first name and a last name. So my first name is Jeffrey, my last name is Willauer. And so, and you probably likewise have a similar first name and a last name. Fred Smith, you know, Fred’s the first name, Smith is the last name. And we tend to think, well, Okay, Jesus is his first name and Christ is his last name, but that’s not actually the case. You see, the term Christ was not originally understood as our Lord’s last name. Jesus Christ’s legal father, Joseph, was not named Joseph Christ. Mary was not Mary Christ.
The term Christ instead was a title. The word Christ in the Greek Christos is the Greek term for Messiah, and Messiah means anointed one. And so to believe in Jesus Christ means to believe, among many other things, it means to believe that Jesus of Nazareth was and is the Messiah whom God had promised in the Old Testament Scriptures, that he is God’s chosen and anointed prophet, priest, and king, the prophet, priest, and king that the Old Testament Scriptures had typified and pointed forward to in the prophetic writings. Now in Matthew, it’s interesting, Matthew introduces his gospel, if you go back to the very first verse of Matthew chapter 1, Matthew begins his gospel in a way that many of us today in our culture would view as rather boring. He starts off with a list of names, with a genealogy.
Well, this is one indication that Matthew’s gospel has justifiably been called the most Jewish of all of the gospels, because as you see, as you know, if you’re familiar with the Old Testament scriptures, there are many genealogies in the Old Testament scriptures, and that’s very significant. God is a God of history, a God who is working out his plan and purposes for his people within the context of chronological history. And so how does Matthew begin his gospel? Well, he says the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, Jesus the Christ. And how does he start off describing Jesus Christ? He is the son of David, the son of Abraham. Now this is incredibly significant, beloved. It’s significant because the Old Testament prophets had predicted that the coming Messiah would be of the house and lineage of King David.
That the Messiah would be great David’s greater son. And by the way, that terminology where Matthew designates Jesus as the son of David. That doesn’t mean that Jesus was the direct son of David. That terminology son of was a way of saying descendant of. Jesus was a descendant of David and then the son of Abraham. Jesus indeed is being pointed to from the very first verse of this gospel. He is being pointed to as great David’s greater son, the promised Messiah, the anointed of the Lord. And so that is how he is described in our passage for today as well. And so that’s very significant. But not only that, we are also told in the scriptures that the covenant promises of God were made to Abraham and to his offspring. Not only has Jesus been introduced by Matthew already as the son or descendant of David, but as the son or descendant of Abraham.
That too is significant because we are told in the scriptures that the covenant promises of God were made to Abraham and his offspring. The Apostle Paul explains this in Galatians 3, verse 16. If you want to flip ahead with me to, very briefly, to Galatians 3, verse 16, Paul writes this. Now the promises, he’s speaking about God’s promises of grace and salvation given to Abraham and Abraham’s seed or offspring. The promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say and to offsprings, referring to many, but referring to one and to your offspring. Who is Christ? Paul the Apostle identifies the one offspring, singular of Abraham, to be the Lord Jesus Christ. And in union with Christ, God’s people are descendants, children of Abraham. Whether you are a Jew or a Gentile, if you are in Christ, you are a child of Abraham.
And Paul makes that point if you skip down to verse 29 of chapter three, Galatians 3, 29. where Paul writes, and if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise. You don’t have to be a Jew for this to be true. You can be a Gentile too. If you are in Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring. The covenant promises of grace and salvation apply to you as well. Now getting back to our passage for today, we are introduced to Jesus the Christ, the one who is great David’s greater son, the promised Messiah, the one in whom all of the covenant promises of God given to Abraham are fulfilled and in union with whom we enjoy those covenant promises of grace and salvation. And so what does all this mean in terms of what does it mean to believe in Jesus Christ?
Well friends, we learn from all of this that to believe in Jesus Christ means believing that he is the promised Messiah. He is the one in whom and through whom all the covenant blessings of salvation are enjoyed by the people of God. And so Again, verse 18, the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. And here’s how it unfolded in redemptive history. These are the events that happened. It says this, when his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. Mary and Joseph were betrothed. Does that mean that they were engaged in the modern sense of that term? Well, it was more than that. Unlike a modern engagement, betrothal in the first century Jewish context was actually considered to be nearly as legally binding as a full consummated marriage itself.
This can be seen from the fact that Joseph, we are told, resolved to divorce her quietly. We’re told that in verse 19. Joseph resolved to divorce Mary quietly once it became obvious that she was pregnant. And the reason that, obviously, that Joseph resolved initially to do that is because the natural assumption would have been, well, Mary must have been unfaithful to me. He must have broken our troth. He must have, she must have been, she must have behaved as an adulteress. And so he resolves to divorce her quietly. Dr. William Hendrickson, the late Reformed Bible commentator, helpfully explains in his comments on this passage the significance of betrothal. He says, and I quote him, betrothal among the Jews must not be confused with present day engagement. It was far more serious and binding. The bridegroom and bride pledged their troth to each other in the presence of witnesses.
In a restricted sense, this was essentially the marriage. Yet though, he goes on to say, yet though the two were now legally, quote, espoused, they were pledged to be married, it was considered proper that an interval of time elapse before husband and wife begin to live together in the same home. Now it was before Joseph and Mary had begun thus to live together, with all this implies both as to domestic and sexual relations, that Mary discovered her pregnancy. She was still a virgin and not yet, quote, married in the full sense of the term. And so this is what’s going on here, and this is why, this is why it says that You know, Mary is described as his wife in this passage. Joseph is described as her husband. Joseph resolves to divorce her because this betrothal arrangement is a legally binding relationship.
And what occurs here? Well, it says this, before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. She was found to be pregnant. And as Matthew explains, the cause of her pregnancy was not the natural, ordinary means of pregnancy. It was a supernatural in its origin. She was found with child from the Holy Spirit. And this occurred before they came together. Now what does that mean, before they came together? In other words, before they assumed full responsibilities as husband and wife, including conjugal relations, the one flesh reality. of the marriage. And I want to point out to you, brothers and sisters, not to go too far afield, but our Roman Catholic friends, one of the dogmas that the Roman Catholic Church teaches is the dogma of the perpetual virginity of Mary.
That after the birth of Jesus, Joseph and Mary lived together in an unconsummated marriage. And this is supposed to show the holiness and and complete consecration of Mary to God. It’s supposed to be a sign of her special holiness. But friends, contrary to the understanding of the Roman Catholic Church, which teaches this dogma of the perpetual virginity of Mary, the most natural interpretation of this phrase includes the implication that Mary and Joseph engaged in normal marital relations once Jesus had been born. Indeed, think about it, if Mary and Joseph, after the birth of Jesus, had lived together in an unconsummated marriage, then they would have been living in sin, since the marriage covenant implies that husband and wife are to give each other their conjugal rights, as the Apostle Paul makes very clear in 1 Corinthians 7, for example.
So indeed, friends, if this is the case, the perpetual virginity of Mary after the birth of Jesus would have meant perpetual sinning on Mary’s part. In other words, contrary to the Roman Catholic view that her perpetual virginity was a sign of her special holiness, Mary’s perpetual virginity would be a sign that she was living in unrepentant sin in the sense of denying Joseph his conjugal rights as her husband. But of course, this takes us very far afield. This is perhaps another sermon for another time. But getting back to our passage, before they came together, before they assumed normal marital relations, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. In other words, friends, our Lord Jesus Christ was not conceived in the ordinary, natural way. Rather, his origin and birth were supernatural and divine.
The agency of our Lord’s conception was not the seed of a man, but the miraculous work of the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Holy Trinity. As we confess in the Apostles’ Creed, Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary. As the church has historically confessed in the more detailed creed known as the Nicene Creed, our Lord was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary and was made man. Dear ones, all of this powerfully underscores the profound and sublime mystery of our Lord’s incarnation. Now, it goes on to say in verse 19, and her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. It seems rather obvious, doesn’t it, friends, that either Joseph was not aware that Mary’s child was in fact conceived by the Holy Spirit, or Mary had tried to tell him, but naturally he did not believe her story.
And we would not blame him because that’s, naturally what we would expect. If there’s an unplanned pregnancy, there is the agency of a man involved. There must be, at least under natural circumstances. But nevertheless, Joseph’s deep love and affection for Mary is evident, for we are told here that Joseph was a just man and unwilling to put her to shame. In other words, he was a just man, he was a godly man, he was a principled man, he was a man who desired to please and honor the Lord and to live in obedience to the law of the Lord. And yet, he was also a gracious and compassionate man. When he saw, when it became obvious that his betrothed was pregnant, and he came to the natural, the understandable conclusion that, well, she must have been unfaithful to me, He didn’t want to pour vengeance upon her.
He didn’t want his pound of flesh for her. He didn’t want to shame her. He wanted to put her away quietly. He wanted to try to limit and constrain her shame. He was indeed a principled and godly man who wanted to do the right thing, but he was also a compassionate and merciful man who did not want to publicly shame his beloved Mary. And basically Joseph had two options open to him. Instead of instituting, he could have instituted a public lawsuit against Mary. And that would have brought great shame upon her. But instead of instituting a public lawsuit against Mary, which again would have brought public shame and scandal upon her, he instead resolved to quietly and privately give her a bill of divorcement. And as I understand it, a bill of divorcement back then only required two witnesses.
And so the effect of a bill of divorcement would have been to limit the scandal and to constrain the scandal and help to guard Mary’s public reputation. But all of this shows the messiness of the fallen world in which we live, but think about what this passage teaches us about the supernatural origin of Christ our Savior. This passage reveals to us that our Lord’s entrance into this world was supernatural in its origin. But oh, how glorious that our supernatural divine Lord was willing to enter into the messiness of this fallen, sin-cursed world, and was willing to do so in order to rescue us from our sins. Praise be to God. We learn next, as we move on in our passage, let’s consider next what our Lord’s supernatural origin teaches us about His person. It goes on to say in verse 20, But as he, as Joseph considered these things, as Joseph mauled this all over in his head, and no doubt he loved Mary, but he’s conflicted.
He wants to do the right thing. As he mauls this over, it says, as he considered these things, behold, behold, that means pay attention. This is important. An angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife. And does that, don’t the words of the angel here indicate that Joseph’s heart’s desire, the desire of his heart was to take Mary as his wife. That was his heart’s desire. The angel saying, don’t fear to do that. Don’t fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. As he considered these things, I like how Dr. Hendrickson explains Joseph’s state of mind. Hendrickson writes, though Joseph has decided on the action he must take, he finds it almost impossible to make the transition from resolve to deed.
But then suddenly, suddenly, behold, as Joseph has drifted into a state of sleep, he receives a supernatural visitation from an angel sent from God. And the angel, praise God, clears up matters for Joseph by explaining to him that the child was not the product of immorality, but was in fact conceived by the Holy Spirit. Now the angelic revelation points to some very important truths about the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. First of all, it says that our Lord was indeed conceived in her. The angel says, Joseph, son of Mary, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. What’s the significance of that? Well this clearly implies that our Lord has a human nature which derived from the substance of the Virgin Mary.
Jesus had Mary’s genes In his body, he derived his human nature from Mary. And yet, we also learn here that Christ was conceived from the Holy Spirit. You see, Mary’s womb was not just an incubator for the divine Son of God. Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin Mary, so that he has a full human nature, but also a full divine nature. Friends, this passage is one of many passages in the New Testament, indeed in all of Scripture, that supports the answer to our Shorter Catechism question and answer 22. If you’re interested in following along with that, that is found in page 969 in the back of your Psalter hymnal. The question is, how did Christ, being the Son of God, become man? How indeed did the eternal Son of God, the Word, the eternal Word, become man?
How did the Word become flesh? The Bible-based answer to that question is Christ, the Son of God, became man by taking to himself a true body and a reasonable soul. being conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost in the womb of the Virgin Mary and born of her, yet without sin. There’s a whole lot of truth packed into that catechism answer. But basically, Jesus Christ, my friends, is revealed in this passage and throughout the scriptures, he is revealed to be the God-man. He’s fully 100% God, fully 100% man, united in one divine person. conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary. Well, Pastor, why is that so important to believe that Jesus of Nazareth was indeed the God-man? Why is it so important to affirm both his divine nature as well as his human nature in order to rightly understand him as our Savior?
Well friends, it’s important to believe in Jesus’ true and full humanity. Jesus Christ had a human body and a human soul, just as we are body souls. He’s not just a God-indwelt man, he is the God-man. He has a true human nature, for it is only as a man that the Savior could represent those for whom he died. We fell in the first Adam, original sin. We inherit a sin nature from Adam. Adam was the original God appointed representative, covenant head and representative of the human race. When Adam fell, we fell in solidarity with him, in union with him. We need a second Adam to represent us, to redeem us, and deliver us from the condition that we have fallen into through our covenantal union with the first Adam. And Jesus Christ, in his humanity, represents his people.
He represents us. And that’s why it’s so important for Jesus to be fully human. You know, one of the earliest heresies in the early church was not a heresy that denied the deity of Christ, but a heresy that denied the full humanity of Christ. The Gnostics denied the full humanity of Christ. They couldn’t imagine that the divine, eternal Christ would want to come and take upon himself filthy human flesh. They had sort of a Greek understanding, a Greek view of the material world as being somehow evil or dirty. But no, my friends, Jesus was fully human, true man, yet without sin. He did not inherit a sin nature, but he was fully man, but he was also fully God. And why was it important for the Christ, the Messiah, to be true God, fully God? because sin is so serious that only God has the power to save us from it.
And so it was requisite, it was necessary for the Christ to be both God and man united in one divine person. And that is what it means, among other things, to confess and believe in Jesus Christ, to believe that he is the promised Messiah and that he is the Word made flesh, that he is the God-man who came to represent us, to live for us, to die on the cross for our sins and to rise from the dead for us, that we who believe in him might not perish but have everlasting life. I want to just read before we get to the last point today, which we will get to briefly, I want to read from Romans chapter 10, verses 8 to 13. The Apostle Paul, in preaching the gospel in the book of Romans, he writes this.
He says, but what does it say? What does the scripture say? The word, that’s the word of faith, the word of the gospel, the good news of Jesus, the word is near you. In your mouth and in your heart, that is the word of faith that we proclaim. Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the scripture says, everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. For the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. for everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
Look especially at verse nine, that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, Jesus, the man Jesus is the divine Lord. In order to rightly believe in and confess Jesus Christ, you must understand and acknowledge that the man Jesus is indeed the divine Lord. You may have a simple childlike faith in that truth, And you certainly don’t have to be a theologian to be a Christian, but basic to Christian belief, basic to saving faith is receiving and trusting in Christ as the God-man, Jesus as Lord, as God and as your Lord and Savior. Do you confess Jesus as your Lord? Do you believe that He died for your sins and rose from the dead? Believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved as the Word of God teaches. But finally, beloved, consider from verse 21 what our Lord’s name reveals about his divine mission, what our Lord’s name reveals about his divine mission.
In the midst of this angelic revelation, as the angel is explaining to Joseph what’s going on, he says this. He says that Mary, his betrothed, will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. And then he explains why you shall call his name Jesus, why Joseph was instructed to name his son Jesus. And remember, Joseph, even though Joseph is not the natural father of Jesus, he is still going to be regarded as our Lord’s legal father. And that, by the way, is one of the reasons why in verse 20 the angel addresses Joseph as Joseph, son of David. This too underscores the fact that Jesus would be of the house and lineage of David, for Jesus’ legal father, Joseph, is a descendant of David as well. So why is he to be named Jesus?
Because he will save his people from their sins. Dear friends, Jesus Christ was sent by God the Father to this earth, not merely to be a great prophet of God, Nor was his mission merely to be a great sage or an insightful rabbi whose purpose was to bring about moral enlightenment or ethical reformation. Neither was Jesus a social reformer, nor a political revolutionary, nor a first century Jewish version of a hippie peacenik. No, beloved, his name is Jesus. In the Hebrew, it’s Yeshua or Yeshua. Joshua. And the name means the Lord is salvation. Children, you know what the name Jesus means? It means the Lord saves. He is called Jesus because He is sent to be our Savior. Yeshua, the Lord is salvation. As the angel reveals to Joseph, he is to be named Jesus, the Lord is salvation.
Why? For he will save his people from their sins. Children, those of you who know the shorter catechism, what is sin? It’s okay to speak it out. Sin is any want or lack of conformity unto or transgression of the law of God. Sin is missing the mark. Sin is not loving the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and not loving your neighbor as yourself. And we have all sinned. No matter how long you’ve been a follower of Jesus Christ, no matter how godly and mature in the faith you are, you are still, and so am I, a sinner. We are justified by grace through faith in Christ. We are adopted as his children. Our sin has been atoned for and covered in Christ, and we’ve been clothed in his righteousness, and yet we still fall short.
And what does the Bible say the wages of sin is? Death, the wages of sin is death. The reason God did not create us to die, the reason we die is because we inherit a sin nature from Adam. And apart from the intervention of his grace, we would willfully and freely choose to live according to that sin nature. Sin is tremendously horrific. Sin separates us from fellowship and friendship with our creator. What we need more than anything else is salvation from sin, and that’s what God the Father sent Jesus to do, to be the savior from sin. He is Jesus. He is the Lord, is salvation. Again, the angel says, you’re to call him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins, not merely make salvation possible, but actually save his people from their sins, not he will save his people from the Romans.
Oh, the first century Jews hated the Romans. They were an occupying force in their land. They wanted to be rid of the reign of the Romans. But Jesus was not sent to save his people from the Romans, nor does it say he will save his people from political oppression, or from economic distress, or from poverty, or from hardship, or from disease, no. He will be a Messiah who saves his people from the greatest enemy that threatens us all, the enemy of sin. That three-letter word, sin, missing the mark, not being conformed to the perfect law of God. And the law of God, the moral law of God, is simply a revelation of God’s holy and righteous character. Dear listener, do you look to Jesus Christ as merely a great moral teacher, perhaps a great prophet, maybe your life coach, maybe a man who was a great religious instructor, a great rabbi, sort of like a Jewish version of a guru?
Or do you look to Him as your Savior from sin? The only Jesus there is, the real Jesus, is the Jesus of the Bible. The Jesus of history is the Jesus of the Bible. The Jesus whose name means the Lord is salvation. The Jesus who came to save His people from their sins. Look to Him as your Savior from sin. That is why He came. Rest in Him. Amen. Let us pray. We thank you for Jesus Christ, and we do indeed believe in Jesus Christ, your only begotten son, our Lord. We ask that you would enable us and empower us to be deepened and strengthened in our faith in Christ, and help us to be faithful to proclaim the name of Jesus, that name which means the Lord is salvation, that others may come to know the Savior and believe upon him for the salvation of their souls.
In Jesus’ name we pray, and all of God’s people said. Amen. Let’s close our time today by rising and we’ll sing as our closing hymn number 492, How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds, 492, 492.
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